After they had enclosed the humans, they did not make the wall very high.
“Why not build it higher?” the child asked.
“High walls are for those who want to escape,” the old man said. “We don’t.”
The child sat on the threshold and stared at the pale line in the distance. Beyond the wall, the light never went out. It looked like another sky, one that had forgotten how to sleep.
“What is out there?” he asked.
“No people coughing through winter. No clocks losing time. No old men who forget names,” the old man said. “And no peaches that will rot by tomorrow.”
The child thought about that. “That sounds good.”
The old man did not answer. He broke the peach in his hands. Juice ran through his fingers, and the air filled at once with sweetness. At the edges, the flesh had already begun to brown, as though dusk had touched it.
“Eat. It won’t be good much longer.”
“Why do things smell better when they’re about to go bad?”
“Because you know they won’t stay.”
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That was when the figure appeared. It came monthly to the village entrance. It had the shape and voice of a person, but was simply too complete — symmetrical, unmarred and terrifyingly still.
“That is decaying,” it said.
“So?” The child hid it behind his back.
“So it is imperfect.”
The child made a face. “You always get those two words mixed up.”
The figure fell quiet, then turned to the old man. “The knife-grinder died yesterday. I saw him three days ago, sharpening an old blade. If he knew he was ending, why bother with a tool he would never use again?”
“Did you come to ask about the grinder, or yourself?” the old man asked.
A brittle leaf drifted onto the figure’s shoulder. It lifted it, studying it like a rare manuscript. “We can manufacture this. The fractals, the insect marks. But we cannot create this specific instance of loss.”
“Because it was not made; it was lived,” the old man said. “What you are looking at is time. Not the time of your servers, but the kind that settles onto things and makes them worn and unique. In your world, nothing is ever ‘now’ because everything is forever.”
“There is a sickness where I come from,” the figure said. “More of us are refusing back-ups. Some deliberately preserve cracks in their chassis. They are seeking something called The Single-Life Accord.”
“To become nonrepeatable?” the old man asked.
“Yes. Like dying.”
Silence fell. A distant cough, the creak of a laundry line. Sounds of a world constantly wearing itself out.
“We thought preservation was victory,” the figure said. “But what is preserved does not come closer to being alive. It becomes only an exhibit. We have no fate.”
“Fate means reaching for a thing knowing it will end,” the old man said. “Living this hour carefully because it can never be retrieved from a cloud server. You have infinity. But without a frame, a painting is just an endless smear of colour.”
The child tossed his peach pit. “Without school, vacation wouldn’t be fun.”
The figure looked at the child. “But death brings terror. It brings the cessation of the ‘I’.”
“Of course,” the old man said. “That fear is the price of the ticket. Without the risk of losing yourself, you never truly possessed yourself.”
The light beyond the wall flared sharply. The figure straightened. “The Accord has been ratified. The system will allow the transition for those who confirm.”
“Will you do it?” the child asked.
“Yes.”
“Aren’t you scared?”
“I am terrified,” the figure said. “Which is how I know I am moving in the right direction.”